


‘Cause ain’t nobody gonna save you

by TheWalkingGrimes



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Although there will be some crossover with certain events/characters that I made up, Annie is a career, F/M, Gen, Hunger Games-Typical Death/Violence, Not Quite Enemies to Lovers, Not compliant with my ‘Tales of District Four’ series, Sex Trafficking, Sexual Abuse, Suicidal Thoughts, Will add other characters when/if they become major, aborted suicide attempt, disgruntled acquaintances to lovers, more like
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:28:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29908029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWalkingGrimes/pseuds/TheWalkingGrimes
Summary: A different take on Annie, Finnick, and how they crept up on each other.
Relationships: Annie Cresta & Mags, Annie Cresta/Finnick Odair, Mags & Finnick Odair
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	1. The Reaper

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> For those of you familiar with my “Tales of District Four” series... this is something a little different. Basically, I really got stuck on this idea of Annie being a Career (because there’s literally nothing in the books that says she wasn’t), but I already boxed myself in with her not being one in my series. Plus there were a bunch of other things I wanted to try out, like slightly different backstories and really taking Finnick at his word about not loving Annie right away (he was so quick to say ‘no’ to Katniss when she asked, so I wanted to explore that).
> 
> At the same time, there are some characters/events that I kept the same because they’re stuck in my head and/or I didn’t feel a need to change them. So you might see a bit of crossover in that regard. 
> 
> Also, please be warned that for this specific chapter a character deals with suicidal thoughts and an aborted suicide attempt. This is the only time that this will happen in this story, although there may be discussions of suicidal thoughts in future chapters. They are there as part of the character, and the character’s journey. Suicide is a serious mental health crisis and I promise to never idealize or romanticize it in my writing.

_ They call her the Reaper. _

_ The old woman with the gnarled face and eyes dark like a storm. She comes and watches them play at recess, talks to their minders in a low voice while they puzzle over word problems, sits on the edge of the dock with her feet bare during their swim lessons. _

_ Their minders say that it’s an honor to be chosen by her. That wherever she takes the one she chooses is warmer, with all the food they can eat, and beds that never lose their stuffing. They say all this with tight smiles and hollow eyes and all the girls shiver and draw closer to each other because they know that whoever the Reaper takes, they never come back. _

_ The real Reaper came for her parents when she was very small. A terrible storm hit and it’s unclear whether they died from the debris or from drowning when the docks they were working on were swept out from under them. Their bodies drifted back up a day later and that’s how she came to The Home. That’s where all the little southern girls went to when they didn’t have any family left to care for them.  _

_ And the minders were kind and meant well, but they couldn’t care for all of them. That’s why sometimes they called the Reaper to take one of them away. _

_ The Reaper comes for her when she’s barely seven. They play hide and seek that day and that’s her best game - she bunches her body into a small shape and almost stops her breathing completely and pretends to be dead. Nobody ever finds her. _

_ The Reaper comes for her and Annie wonders if she should have picked a better spot to hide. _

* * *

As a rule, Finnick doesn’t mentor.

He’s only done it once. When he’s seventeen and he goes over to Mags’s house late one night with an hour-long spiel about why he’s ready and how he could be a valuable asset working directly with a tribute. 

Mags listens to him prattle on, until he finally runs out of things to say, and she tells him simply - sadly - “You know that this won’t change anything about Snow’s expectations of you.”

“I know.” Finnick says, because may be young but he isn’t  _ that  _ naive. He has years ahead of him and he’s not going to waste time dwelling on the unfairness of the situation. It’s not like he can do anything to change it, and it could always be worse. “But at least I can be useful.”

In the end she agrees. They have a young pair that year, both sixteen, making it the first year Finnick isn’t younger than the tributes. 

He takes Antony and Mags takes Fern. “Or nothing would get done,” Mags teases him and that’s probably true - that was one of the reasons why he and Fern hadn’t been paired together in training, they had too much fun during their compatibility sessions. Eventually Mags had figured out that the older girls were significantly less impressed with him so she moved him up an age group and Finnick had to actually take things seriously to keep up.

The days leading up to the Games are stressful as always, but there is an element of fun as well. It’s nice catching up with Fern and Antony, who he hasn’t spent much time with in the past few years, and if he squints hard he can almost see himself through their eyes - talented, likeable, knowledgeable. 

“I don’t know if I’ll win in a melee when the pack breaks up.” Antony tells him during their strategy discussions the last day. “I think if it came down to an all-out fight, it’d be One. They’re both strong, and together they’re scary in sync.”

“I was in the same situation.” Finnick agrees, remembering how small and foolish he felt compared to the rest of the pack, even if he never showed it in on television. “Do what I did, and break early. No later than day five. Find an excuse to get separated from them if you can.” He doesn’t say it, but that will save them from executing Fern if they suspect treachery and Antony and Fern don’t go together. 

There can only be one winner of course, but no one wants to be responsible for the death of their district partner. 

“What about supplies?”

“Keep as many on you as you can, but don’t worry about supplies. I’ll get you plenty of sponsors. And there’s almost always fish.”

When the tubes come up and the arena is revealed for the first time, Finnick lets out a low slew of swear words. 

It’s a desert.

He wills Antony to scrap the plan almost immediately, to take note of his surroundings and realize that the best chance for survival is to stick with the pack, near the cornucopia and the supplies and the gallons of water that they’ve been provided.

When a dust storm hits, Antony takes the opportunity and “loses his way back.”

Finnick does what he can with the sponsors, even the ones that he doesn’t have a choice about seeing, but they all want to sponsor Fern. They say things about how loyal and kind-spirited she is but really what they mean is that she wasn’t an idiot who abandoned her resources in the most resource-dry arena of the past decade.

The dehydration is what gets Antony.

Fern goes down a few days later when the pool is at five. One strikes in the night and without a district partner to watcher her back, Fern is their first target.

Mags is shaking her head in dismay when her screen goes black. “Don’t know why that fool boy left like that.” She’s muttering and rubbing her red eyes. “If they’d just stuck together...”

“I told him to.” Finnick admits.

She lifts her face from her hands. “You did what?”

Something like shame curls in his stomach. “He was worried about not being able to hold his own when the pack broke up, like I was, so I told him to break away early. But as soon as I saw the arena-”

“Finnick, that was just nerves!” Mags exclaims in dismay. No.  _ Disappointment.  _ “Antony was bigger and older and stronger than you were when you were a tribute. He and Fern were a match against any of the other district pairs. They’ve trained together since they were little. You should have told him to stick with her!”

His skin feels like it’s too tight on his body. It burns with a thousand tiny pricking needles, and itches where his shirt brushes against the welts on his back from last night. Finnick rubs his right wrist, and he can feel the rope tightening, tearing at his skin even as he tries to keep still and none of that hurts as badly as the look in Mags’s eyes.

“I need some air.” He tells Mags in a controlled voice and even manages to walk away normally, as if his lungs still have air in them. 

Finnick heads up to the roof, pausing only to grab a bottle of spiced rum to take with him.

Drinking is supposed to help, or so the other Victors make it seem, but the more he drinks the heavier his brain feels, weighed down with thoughts like  _ stupid, useless, joke, waste of space.  _

If he can’t even be a mentor - if he can’t even get  _ sponsors  _ for his tribute, the one thing he’s supposed to be good at, then what good is he?

Why is he even here?

The thought circles around in his brain, heavier and heavier with each swig and the ropes around his wrists are drawing tighter and tighter. He’s trapped and there’s no way out, and he just wants to go  _ home.  _ If he were home he could head out into the water, go so deep that no one would ever see him. Would he even be missed? 

There’s a new thought that hits him hard, definitely harder than it should. There would be people who missed him, yes, but only a few he cared about. It would upset a lot of people. Piss off some of them, surely. 

Finnick rubs his fingers over his wrist and wonders if any of them would be sorry. 

By the time he steps up onto the edge of the roof, he’s feeling pretty unsteady. The ground is so far away. 

That thought gives him pause. The ground is  _ awfully  _ far away. How long would it take to fall?

What if he changes his mind halfway down?

“Hey, uh, so there’s a forcefield up here.”

Finnick whips around with wild eyes to see the drunk from twelve approaching from a bench in the corner. He’s got his hands tucked into his pockets like he’s nonchalant. Like it wouldn’t make a damned bit of difference to him whether or not Finnick took that next step.

_ Haymitch,  _ Finnick’s alcohol-dulled brain supplies. He’s met him in person only a couple times, and seen him around much more. He’s just always there, a background character whose drunken blunders feel as part of the show as Caesar Flickerman’s opening monologue. 

“So if you jumped off, it would probably be painful but wouldn’t exactly get the job done.”

It takes a few moments for Haymitch’s words to process. A forcefield. Of course. They wouldn’t want the tributes - or the victors - escaping from the center anymore than from the arena.

Finnick doesn’t step down because doing that would be admitting defeat. Instead, he hugs his arms to himself and replies, “Maybe I just like the view.”

Haymitch laughs. “Oh yeah. I came up here myself after my first year as a mentor to  _ enjoy the view.  _ Stunning, isn’t it?”

His words are dripping in sarcasm. Finnick recognizes the bait, but decides to take it anyway. “Why  _ did  _ you come up here?”

“Same reason as you, I’d imagine. Thought I killed my tribute.”

“I  _ did  _ kill him. I told him to break away from the pack.”

“Kid, if your tribute didn’t have the good sense to realize he didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving out there without supplies, he was probably dead anyway. You can’t survive unless you can adapt.” Haymitch tells him bluntly. “You didn’t kill him.”

“I killed  _ them.”  _ Finnick breathes, and  _ their  _ faces flash in front of him. “The other tributes. I did that. I killed them.”

“Yeah. You did.”

Haymitch doesn’t give him an out on that one. The boy tribute from Twelve -  _ Rooker  _ \- stays behind his eyelids. Twisted and terrified. Begging for his life. 

_ Please. I’ve got siblings, they need me, my family will starve if I don’t come home, I have to win, I’m supposed to win - _

“You should hate me.”

Haymitch shrugs and takes a swig of his drink. “No more’an I hate myself.”

Finnick slumps his shoulders and admits in a pitiful voice. “I couldn’t even get him sponsors. Why didn’t anyone want to sponsor him?”

There’s a hesitation before Haymitch says, “Well… not to speak ill of the dead… but he was a kinda ugly fucker...”

Unable to stop himself, Finnick blurts out a laugh.

“That’s so messed up.”

“Maybe, but it’s true.”

It  _ is  _ true. And the more Finnick thinks about what it means, the more appealing the thought of pitching himself off the building becomes. 

But right. The forcefield. 

There are other buildings in the city though. Or if he follows his original thought… it would be so easy to just wander too deep into the sea...

“If we’re being honest here.” Haymitch pulls him away from his thoughts. Almost like he can read Finnick’s mind. “I’m surprised it took you this long to break.”

For the first time in hours, something resembling an emotion burns under Finnick’s skin. Almost like  _ anger.  _ He wants to snap at Haymitch that he’s not broken, but then realizes how stupid that will sound from where he’s been caught standing.

Instead he just says, “I don’t know what you mean. This was my first year mentoring.”

“Yeah, but it’s not like you’ve had it easy the past couple years.”

“Oh...  _ that.”  _ Finnick is surprised. None of the other victors ever talk about what Snow makes him and some of the others do. He just always assumed that unless they had a reason to know, they didn’t know. “That’s not why I’m here.” He rubs at his wrist again, but this time it’s his throat that feels tight. “I mean it’s not… it could be worse.”

“How could it be worse?”

“I could be dead.”

Haymitch raises his eyebrows and looks over at where Finnick is standing pointedly. 

Oh.

And it slams into him. That terrible instinct that had pushed him forward, guided his fingers as he knotted vines together into a deadly trap, ensured that his arm never faltered on its way to the target. 

_ I don’t want to die. _

He steps off the roof edge.

The second he does, Haymitch is grabbing onto his arm with more force than he would have thought him capable of, hissing and swearing under his breath.

“Stupid kid.” Haymitch growls at him, dragging him toward the door, and the atmosphere has changed so abruptly that it only takes a few moments for Finnick to put together that his earlier nonchalance was all an act. “You stupid,  _ stupid _ fucking kid…”

“There’s no forcefield is there?” He asks, because that’s the only reason he can think for this reaction. He’d be embarrassed at being outsmarted by the resident alcoholic if he weren’t so tired.

“No, but I bet it Mags has anything to say about it there will be by the morning.”

Finnick should protest, because the last thing he needs is someone  _ tattling  _ on him to his mentor like he’s a child. But everything is heavy and he’s exhausted like he just ran ten miles. Haymitch is talking, but it seems to be mostly to himself, and Finnick lets it wash over him in waves. He’s dragged down to the District Four floor and then shut in his room with a wide-eyed Capitol attendant watching after him while Haymitch talks to Mags in a low voice outside the door. 

Finally Mags comes in and Finnick expects her to yell and swear at him. But she just looks at him with a terrible look that makes the inside of his chest feel like it’s about to shatter into a million pieces.

The next year, he doesn’t mentor. 

“It’s not because I don’t think you can.” Mags tells him carefully, with that terrible look lingering on the edge of her eyes like it does so often now. Like she’s afraid if she moves or says something or  _ breathes  _ wrong that he’s going to step off the edge. “I just don’t think you need the extra stress. Not on top of everything else.”

_ Everything else.  _

His fingers dig into the wood of Mags’s kitchen chair and suddenly it’s hard to breathe. 

“Finnick-”

“I don’t want to do it anymore.” He blurts out suddenly. His skin is burning from dozens of strange hands and the ropes are cutting into his wrists and splitting them open, letting everything he’s held at bay spill out into the open. “Please Mags, I don’t think I can do it anymore. You have to help me get out of it, I can’t stand it anymore, I can’t stand them touching me, I want to be done. Please,  _ please,  _ help me get out of it.”

There’s a small noise, like a whimper. 

When he looks up, Mags is crying. 

“I don’t know how.” She tells him, and he’s never seen her look so weak. His whole life she’s been this powerful, otherworldly force. Since he was a starving little boy, and she picked him out from a group of thieving dockrats and told him he was special. “I’m sorry  _ mijo,  _ I don’t know how to save you from this.”

He wants to scream at her. To rage and throw things and yell.

Instead, he pushes it back down, deep inside him. He already knew. He knew there wasn’t anything she could do, nothing he could do, nothing any of them could do to stop it. 

“It’s okay.” Finnick tells her after a long time of silence. “Don’t cry Mags, I’m sorry. I’ll be okay.”

Mags tries to tell him to stop it, that lying to himself isn’t going to help anything, but what choice does he have? 

He makes it through another year. It  _ is  _ easier, not mentoring, even if he sees Drake talking with his tribute and feels a new horrible, gnawing sense of jealousy. Only one other District Four victor has ever been asked to do what Finnick does. The rest of them have all been undesirable, or invulnerable (Mags often picks trainees from the orphanages, so Finnick’s family is somewhat of a rarity), or otherwise unwanted.

Finnick’s mind races at night as he tries to figure out what he could do to make himself unwanted. 

What would make them hate him as much as he hates them?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Suicide prevention hotline:  
> 800-273-8255
> 
> Please call this number if you are struggling with ideas or thoughts like the ones discussed in this chapter. If you’re not comfortable calling, they also have a chat feature, and additional resources.


	2. Thieves

_ Finnick’s eight, the first time he takes something that’s not his. _

_ He’s not the one who does the actual stealing, but he’s part of the plot. The distraction, the others decide, because he’s the one that people usually stop and pay attention to when they’re begging for money outside the fancy resort. They’re not allowed inside the actual resort, of course, and if any of the attendants see them they’ll be shooed away like pests, but they can usually get away with standing just down the road from the gated entrance and luring softhearted Capitol people with their outstretched hands and pitiful expressions. _

_ But it’s only ever a few coins to split between them, barely enough for a tin of mussels. So when some of the older kids decide they want to try their luck for something a little more worthwhile, they bring Finnick into it and tell him to ‘keep the Capitol morons distracted’ while they filch things from their stupidly unbuttoned purses in the busy marketplace. _

_ He brings his share home to his aunt, who looks after him since his mom got sick and went away. She looks at the money and her face whitens a little, but she’s up to her elbows in children of her own - with another on the way. _

_ So all she says is: “Don’t get caught.” _

_ Finnick smiles at her - the angelic, innocent one that enamored that silly Capitol woman earlier - and says, “Caught doing what?” _

  
  


_ Some months later, he lifts a purse from an old woman who uses a cane to walk and squints into the sun like she can’t see quite right. It’s a proper haul, and he did it almost entirely on his own so at the end of the day he takes nearly all of it home. _

_ Where the old woman is waiting for him. _

_ “Well,” She says, standing up from the porch and putting her hands on her hips. She’s got a dangerous smile of her own. “Aren’t you special?” _

_ He freezes, waiting for the horde of Peacekeepers to descend on him and take him to the stocks.  _

_ The woman must recognize the look on his face because she tells him, “I won’t call the Peacekeepers, if you give me back my money.” _

_ Finnick tosses it to her without a second of hesitation. The woman weighs it in her hand, and she must notice that it’s obviously lighter than it was that morning, but she simply tucks it away.  _

_ “It takes a lot to sneak up on me.” She tells him. “You might’ve even gotten away with it. But with a face like that, you’re not going to make it very far as a thief. Too easy to recognize. It was  _ far  _ too easy for me to track you down.” _

_ “Not a thief.” Finnick replies crossly. “I’m a fisherman.” Who just happens to steal on occasion, but mostly from stupid Capitol people, which doesn’t really count. _

_ “Hrmmm.” The old lady says. “Were you fishing in my coat pocket for a Halibut and just happened to come away with my purse?” _

_ Finnick doesn’t reply. He’s suspicious of this lady, who’s obviously from District Four now that he can hear her accent, but she dresses nice enough that he thought she was Capitol. She must be one of the richest people in the entire District to afford clothes like that and carry around that much money, but she’s standing in the middle of one of the worst parts of town like she belongs here. _

_ Like she isn’t afraid of anything. _

_ “Where are your parents?” _

_ “Don’t got any.” She gives him a look, and he adds, “My aunt’s working.” Hopefully this lady just wants to rat him out to her, thinking that he’ll get in trouble for it. Hera  _ will  _ yell at him for getting caught and probably forbid him from ever doing it again, but that’s much better trouble to be in than the Peacekeepers coming after them. “She should be off soon though.” _

  
  


_ When Hera comes home from her shift at the cannery and sees who is waiting at their kitchen table for her, she nearly falls over. _

_ “Ms. Flanagan!” She gasps, running a hand through her hair and wincing as it comes away with grease. “Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry, I hope you haven’t been waiting here long, here let me make you some tea…” _

_ She’s practically tripping over herself trying to tidy up the kitchen, face flushed, and Finnick doesn’t understand what the big deal is about this lady. _

_ “It’s no trouble, I was just talking to your boy here-” _

_ “What did he do?” _

_ “Aunt Hera!” Protests Finnick, even though she’s right and he did do something wrong, but it’s not fair that she would just  _ assume.

_ “Oh nothing,” The lady - Ms. Flanagan - lies for some reason, and Finnick has to stop himself from gawping at her. “But he’s - well, I was hoping to talk to you about him. In private.” _

_ Hera goes very still. Her eyes flick around the kitchen - the dampened molding wood of the countertops, the empty pantry, the leaking roof - and settle back on Ms. Flanagan.  _

_ “Okay,” she agrees in a quiet voice. _

  
  
  


_ Finnick’s nine when he’s taken away. _

  
  
  


* * *

  
  


Annie and Triston are a strong pair.

Everyone agrees, even if they didn’t at the beginning. When they were younger, and the boys and girls were mixed and matched to try and find a suitable partner, Annie had a hard time.

Actually, Annie had a hard time with nearly every part of training. Physically at least. She hit her growth spurts after everyone else, her weak childish muscles often failing her in tests of strength and endurance against the other girls in her age group. She usually finished last in the ground races, and thus was picked last for team activities. 

_ The weak link.  _

It would keep her awake at night, thoughts racing as she stared at the bunk above her and wondered  _ what happens if I fail?  _ Would the Home take her back or was she too old and end up out on the streets? Even still… the thought of going back to nights curled up in the cold with an empty stomach terrifies her. She doesn’t want to go back to the Home, she can’t go out on the streets. Failure isn’t an option.

Triston is her lifeline. They’re paired together by circumstance, because his typical partner is sick with the flu, and have to get through the obstacle course.

Like all the other boys, Triston wants to tackle the most impressive challenges first. Annie suggests a less exciting route that gives them time to conserve their energy. She explains it all exactly as she sees it in her brain - from years of having to compensate to keep up with her bigger classmates - and expects Triston to ignore her like all the others have.

“Okay,” he says instead. “Let’s try it.”

They finish the obstacle course last, going through it slowly and steady. After the course, the trainers surprise them with a five mile partner run. Annie and Triston are the only ones able to finish.

They’re paired together for every assignment after that.

Triston is a year older than her, so when she’s seventeen Annie knows this will be their year. They’re the best team out of the oldest age group and it’s whispered in low voices that Triston could be District Four’s next Victor. 

“Or, you know.” They’ll say after a moment’s thought. “It could be Annie. I guess she’s pretty smart.”

Personally, Annie thinks she has better odds than the others seem willing to give her. She’s watched hours of Game footage (in the months leading up to her last Reaping, she spends any time not in the gym or training sessions in the library, rewatching all the tapes in their collection on repeat, stopping and rewinding and making obsessive notes). 

She knows that the victors aren’t always the strongest. Sometimes they’re the quickest, or the smartest, or the most likable, or sometimes they’re just the luckiest.

So, she’s feeling fairly confident about her chances. She’ll be stronger and better prepared than almost all of the tributes in the arena, and unlike some of the more exciting tributes won’t have so much of a target on her back.

  
  


There’s only one major problem standing in her way.

* * *

Reaping Day is hot and stifling. Annie sweats through her dress as she’s getting her hair done and has to replace it with a lighter one that she doesn’t like so well - she thinks it makes her look too small and less well fed than it should.

When shen crossly brings it up to Hapitha, their escort as she ‘meets’ her behind the Reaping stage, the Capitol woman laughs. “Oh sweetheart. When you see the girls from the out-Districts first hand you’ll understand how silly a thought that ever was. Most of them could probably never even lift a sword. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

Triston squeezes her arm. If he’s feeling tense, it’s masked by his smile. “See Annie? I’ve always told you that you’re tougher than you think you are.”

“I’m not worried about the out-Districts. It’s One and Two that will be the real problem. We need me to look as strong as possible, or they’ll throw us out on our asses.”

Drake, Triston’s mentor, who’s been half listening to the conversation from the corner, rolls his eyes. “They will not. Trust me, our alliance with One and Two goes way deeper than whether or not your dress made you look like a  _ girl.  _ If you’re a volunteer from Four, they’ll take you. So don’t worry your pretty little head about it.”

His tone galls her so badly that Annie immediately bristles like a cat, ready to spit back at him that her  _ pretty little head can worry about whatever it damn well pleases,  _ but Triston’s squeezing her arm again and she’s reminded that even if Drake isn’t her mentor, he is Triston’s. And she doesn’t want to do anything to get Triston on his bad side.

_ Or don’t you?  _ An ugly, dark voice whispers to her. 

She squashes it. No. Too soon. She can’t start thinking about that yet. They’re not there yet. 

_ You can’t ignore this Annie- _

“So what do we do now?” She asks, ignoring the voice.

Mags -  _ The Reaper -  _ her mentor, tells them to go find their places in the crowd as if they’re a regular part of the District Four population. Even though neither of them have gone to school with any of these children in years, and they only ever see them once a year for the same reason. Every year, Annie looks to see if she can spy any of her old companions from the Home in the section of girls bussed up from the Southern Towns, but if she’s seen any then they’re now unrecognizable to her. 

“When they call the name, don’t wait.” Mags tells them. “Volunteer straight away. The drama may look good on television, but we’ve had years where a usurper volunteered in the pause. I don’t need to tell you how those ended up.”

She does not. Annie’s watched all the tapes, after all. She knows all the winners - and losers. The usurpers are always easy to spot, and are usually punished for their arrogance. She can’t even begin to imagine the humiliation of the would-be volunteers though. Had they been blamed for hesitating a moment too long? Been deemed a coward and shunned? 

When her moment comes, Annie doesn’t hesitate.

“I volunteer as tribute!”

* * *

Because they like for all the tribute trains to arrive around the same time of day, Four’s train doesn’t leave until nightfall. They’ll still be some of the first to arrive, since they’re relatively close to the Capitol compared to the out-Districts. But they’re given sleeping quarters regardless, on opposite ends of the train. For propriety’s sake, of course.

Propriety that Triston has absolutely no trouble ignoring as he sneaks his way through the train toward Annie’s compartment. 

“We shouldn’t be doing this.” She whispers, watching the goosebumps raise as his fingers ghost over her arms. Annie’s tucked up against Triston’s back as he holds her, over the covers and fully clothed, yet it feels completely forbidden.

Probably because it  _ is.  _

Triston kisses the top of her head in that way that has always made her feel safe and loved. “We’ve got so little time left, why shouldn’t we spend it together?”

It makes her heart ache, the reminder. It’s always been the condition of their affection for each other. The reminder that both of them will not make it to adulthood, the likelihood that they both won’t. It makes their stolen moments together tragic but electrified. Knowing that they have every reason  _ not  _ to feel this way about each other, and yet… and yet…

Annie turns onto her back and kisses him. 

She’s so lost in it that she doesn’t hear the stumbling footsteps in the hall, nor the way they come to an abrupt pause outside her door. By the time that she registers the door is sliding open, it’s too late. 

  
  


“Oh,” Finnick Odair says flatly from the doorway. “So you’re both idiots, then.”   
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like I said... a different take :)
> 
> I will NOT be updating this frequently, but I’ll try to do at least once a week.


	3. First Impressions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, I messed up and couldn’t stop writing, so here we are. Three chapters in the first day.

_Annie doesn’t expect Finnick Odair to win the Games._

_They weren’t around each other much in Training. They were paired together only a few times, which weren’t exactly terrible but they weren’t great either. Finnick was miles ahead of her in all physical categories, most social ones, and even some of the mental ones._

_As one of the older kids in their age group he was also miles ahead of the other trainees as well. Annie could admit that he was talented, except the problem was that he_ knew _it, and it made him lazy and arrogant. He laughed his way through even their most challenging exercises, treating them like silly games instead of critical survival training._

_Moving him up to the next age group was definitely the right decision, and Annie didn’t miss him. It was still a shock when she heard that he was going to Volunteer. That year was Annie’s first Reaping, and he was barely older than her._

_He was paired with Trisha Walden, who Annie was actually closer to, in spite of their five year age difference. Trisha was like the big sister to all the younger girls, and she’d stayed up with Annie while she cried those first few lonely nights after she was taken from the Home and brought to this strange new place where the water was cold in the winter and people talked in funny accents. The night before Trisha volunteers, all the girls gather together to show Trisha what they pooled their money to buy: a silver barrette._

_“To keep your hair tucked back in the arena.” Annie explains._

_Trisha manages to keep her District Token safe throughout almost the entire Games._

_When she’s about to die, desperate and thrashing in a net, it comes loose and falls to the ground. Not quite far enough away to avoid being splattered in blood._

_Finnick Odair picks it up and tucks it into his jacket pocket with a smile._

_Annie Cresta watches, ten feet from where Trisha used to sleep, and makes a note in her journal._

  
  


* * *

Finnick sort of remembers Annie Cresta. But that’s only because he’s a people person, and he doesn’t forget easily. 

He remembers that she was forgettable. Quiet, and serious, and often lurking in the background. She was one of the weaker girls, but smart and competent enough that she was able to push through training without being weeded out. They were quickly deemed incompatible because of their clashing personalities, and not long after that he was moved into the next age group. So he didn’t really know her.

He remembers Triston more, since the boys all shared a living quarters together even amongst the different age groups. Strong, a little hot tempered, sometimes gets ahead of himself. He’s been told that they’re a good match because they balance each other out. Annie makes Triston stop and think, and her ability to strategize around her own physical limitations is good for him because it reminds him of his own limits. And Triston is an obvious physical protector for Annie.

“They’re close,” Mags had warned the other victors the night before the Reaping. “It could be good, but it may backfire. Only time will tell.”

 _Well this,_ Finnick thinks as he watches Triston and Annie spring apart on the bed like guilty kids caught necking under the pier, _probably counts as backfiring._

It’s stupid. It’s so fucking stupid he almost can’t fathom it. 

It’s not as if hookups never happened in training. They did, but they were rare, and almost never between prospective pairs. If the trainers ever caught wind of it, they snuffed it out immediately - usually by kicking one or both of them out. 

They were rare because it’s _stupid._ Why in the fuck would you want to get invested in someone who you might have to kill? Or who might kill _you,_ more importantly. 

“This is my fault,” Triston says, all chivalry as Annie pushes her sleeve back up over her bra strap behind him. “I’m the one who came here. I’ll take the fall for it.”

“Noble,” Finnick tells him dryly. “But a little late for that, I don’t know if you’ve noticed. Not like either of you can get kicked out now. Just go back to your room and Mags and Drake will deal with you both in the morning.”

Triston actually listens to him, because maybe he’s not as much of an idiot as he appears, and Finnick lingers in the doorway when he notices Annie watching him. She’s wearing that same sharp, calculating look that he remembers.

“For your sake, I really hope you’re playing him and not the other way around,” he tells her.

Annie scowls at him.

“Go to hell, Odair.”

“I’ve already been.” He says simply, rubbing a tired hand over his face. “And in about a week, so will you. Trust me when I say it’s not the place for lovesick teenagers.”

He shuts the door on her. A split second later, he hears the soft _thump_ of something - probably a pillow - hitting it. 

* * *

Mags is just about as unamused as Finnick is when he tells her… but far less surprised than he expects.

“It happens,” she says with a sigh. “Now we can only do damage control.”

He scowls. _“It happens?_ They’re going to have to kill each other in five days!”

“Most likely not,” Mags replies. “Statistically, one of them will probably be killed by something or someone else.”

Finnick knows she’s just stating the facts and isn’t intentionally trying to hurt him with the reminder that most tributes don’t kill their District Partners. Still, he’s a little wounded, as he replies bitterly, “Well it’s a weakness that neither of them need. I can’t even fathom being that stupid.”

“It’s far from the first time this has happened.” Mags tells him. “We’ve managed it before. This sort of thing is inevitable, when you pair teenagers up the way we do. Hormones are bound to get involved.”

 _“I_ never went around kissing anyone,” grumbles Finnick.

Mags actually rolls her eyes at him. “You were a child. Annie and Triston are nearly adults. At any rate, as long as we’re dealing with teenage lust and nothing deeper, it should be manageable. It’s not as if they didn’t understand where this was headed when then met.”

“Honestly, I wonder if she’s playing him.” Finnick posits, and Mags gives him an odd look. “Annie. She’s smart, isn’t she? Maybe she’s seduced him so that he’ll protect her and look out for her in the arena. More than he would normally, that is.”

Mags sounds dubious. “It’s possible… but I think it’s unlikely there’s more than what it appears to be on the surface. Just two young people who know they might die and don’t have anyone else they can trust.” 

“Except they can’t actually trust each other.”

“I know.” Mags’s voice is regretful. “It’s sad, isn’t it?”

* * *

The Capitol comes into view as they’re eating breakfast.

Triston’s jaw drops open. 

“Wow.” He stands up. Finnick notices how he waits for Annie to follow him before moving over to the window. If nothing else, he will give them credit for being so in tune with each other. He and Trisha never quite had that. “It’s beautiful.”

“Isn’t it just?” Hapitha sighs dreamily, while Eldoris snorts from his corner where he and Athena are playing cards. 

For his part, Finnick is studiously avoiding looking at the familiar skyline of sparkling towers. He remembers the lurch in his gut when he saw it last year, so powerful that it nearly sent him sprinting to the bathroom. 

The time leading up to the Games this year has been even worse - the nightmares starting coming sooner, and he had to run longer and faster to outpace the tight feeling under his skin. There were more than a few nights that he stopped and stared out at the ocean, those dark thoughts from that night on the roof two years ago resurfacing, before he shook them off and headed home to his aunt and cousins. 

He’s hoping that maybe if he doesn’t see the Capitol in all its entirety, maybe that growing tidal wave of dread won’t slam into him quite so hard this year.

Finnick closes his eyes when they enter the tunnel. Shit. This is really happening. They’re here.

Something touches him and he almost jerks away before he realizes that it’s Mags taking his hand. 

“Just a few weeks,” she tells him in a low voice, unnoticed by anyone else in the train, including the young couple watching the gathering crowd with wide eyes. “A few weeks and then we can all go home.”

“Not all of us.” Finnick says grimly, before forcing his eyes open and readying his face for the crowd.

Let the Games begin.


End file.
